U.S. Provisional Application No. 61/216,521, filed May 18, 2009, is incorporated herein in its entirety by reference.
A variety of bulk materials are conveyed by elongate conveyors carried on vehicles such as harvesters, carts, wagons, and the like, herein collectively referred to generally by the term cart. As a non-limiting example, are agricultural crop materials, such as silage, crop residue such as cobs from corn, and the like, and animal waste or manure. Of particular interest presently are corn cobs and other crop residue, for which demand has recently increased, due to use in making ethanol. The generation of corn cobs in volume occurs during the corn harvesting process, which is typically done using a combine, generally by threshing and cleaning the kernels of corn from the cobs, husks and other residue or stover.
The corn kernels are typically collected, at least initially, in a clean grain tank of the combine, which is periodically unloaded, often on the go, during the harvesting operation. If the cobs (and/or other residue) is/are collected, a separate container is typically used, and is often a cart or wagon towed by the combine. Due to limitations on the towing capacity of combines, the size or capacity of such carts or wagons is limited, and thus the cart or wagon must also be unloaded from time to time, often at different times or frequency than the unloading of the corn, which can have a negative effect on productivity and efficiency. As a result, it would be valued to have the capability to unload the cobs on the go while harvesting. This would typically entail having a receiving container, such as a larger cart, a truck or the like, moving at the same speed beside the cart to be unloaded, in sidewardly spaced relation thereto.
A receiving container will typically be a relatively tall structure, thus necessitating an ability to unload into such structure from an equal or greater height. Typically, it is desirable to unload carts or wagons from the bottom, such that the material being unloaded must be conveyed upwardly from the lower region of the cart, to a sufficient height for unloading into the receiving container, which necessitates use of a conveyor having a relatively long length. It is also commonly desired for an unloader conveyor to be carried on board a cart or wagon, but if the conveyor extends upwardly beyond the top of the cart, it can contact various obstacles, such as trees, low hanging wires, and the like.
As another potential problem wherein it is contemplated that an unload conveyor will be operated using pressurized fluid, there can be a lack of pressurized fluid capacity of the supplying machine or system for handling the additional fluid load of the conveyor, particularly when the conveyor includes high fluid demand devices such as fluid cylinders and the like.
Thus, what is sought is an unloader system for a bulk materials cart, wagon or other vehicle or container, having a conveyor with a sufficient length for unloading material upwardly into a relatively high receiver, and which can be stowed on board the cart without projecting significantly thereabove, and which overcomes one or more of the problems set forth above.